True Places(90)

Reid was about to ask what he meant, but of course he already knew. His dad had fucked up. “It’s okay, Dad.” It wasn’t, but Reid didn’t know how to handle the crying.

His father pulled himself together a little, wiping his nose and adjusting his shoulders. His eyes were bloodshot. He looked old and desperate. “I don’t know what to do, Reid. I don’t know how to fix what’s broken. I’m not even sure how it all happened. I thought I was doing the right thing, the right thing for me, sure, but for the family, too. I thought I was making something big, something that was for all of us. That was the idea.”

“I know, Dad.” Reid hadn’t quite seen it this way before. His father was trying to do the right thing, like he said. Problem was, he was gunning so hard he’d blown right past all the other stuff—the harder stuff, the tricky stuff.

His father’s expression was intense now. “Do you know? Do you really? Because I thought you of all people didn’t get me.” He had his edge back, and the tears weren’t even dry on his cheeks. Figured.

“Oh, I get you, Dad. I get you.” Reid hesitated, unsure of how much to say. He felt the anger flare in his gut. Fuck it. “You’re successful. You bring home the money. And you’re proud of it.” His dad flinched. Pride was a double-edged sword. “But there’s everything you are not seeing, all the stuff that passes you by, that you wave away because you have your eye on the real prize and the rest is fluff.”

“You guys aren’t fluff to me. Don’t say that.”

“You’re pretty damn oblivious.”

“Well, I’m busy. I work a lot. I can’t pay attention to everything.”

Reid leaned closer. “Do you really think it’s okay to tell your kids you were too busy getting money to give a damn about them?”

“Now, Reid. Don’t be like that.”

“Be like what? Like what?” He threw his arms out wide. “How should I be, Dad? You know, right? You know exactly what I should want and what choices I ought to make and which friends I should have, right? Right?”

His father put his hands up in defense. “Hey, whatever I was doing, it was for you.”

Reid jumped to his feet. “That is such bullshit! So I could be a success, huh? Not just any success, but your idea of success. You want me to be you.” Reid spit out the words, filling the word you with all the disgust and betrayal he felt.

His father had been watching him. Now he looked away and became very still. A long moment passed before he turned to Reid, looked him in the eye, and nodded.

“You’re right. I wanted you to be me.” A simple admission delivered in a boardroom tone.

Reid felt his face burning. “I’m not a deal, Dad. I’m not something you can take credit for.”

“I know.”

“Do you?” Reid’s throat clogged. He was losing control and fought to get it back. “It’s not like I’m a failure. I’m good at things. I care about stuff.”

His father’s bluster dissolved; his eyes filled with tears. “I know you do. You’re a good kid, Reid.” His voice cracked and he cleared his throat. “I’m paying attention now. I really am.”

Reid nodded and wiped his nose. A wave of exhaustion came over him.

His father stood and grabbed him by the shoulders and pulled him into a hug. Reid didn’t resist. It was awkward—he couldn’t remember the last time his father had held him—but that didn’t mean it wasn’t good. His father was holding him and Reid was holding his father, who was half crying, half laughing in relief, or in regret. Probably both. Reid knew because he was doing the same, for the same reasons.





CHAPTER 40

Iris ran blindly through the woods, her mind spinning. Ash was gone, truly gone. A hill rose before her and she dug in to climb it, pressing hard, pushing away branches in her path. Her vision blurred. She rubbed her forearm across her face and swallowed hard, her throat raw. She crested the hill and careened down to a stream, splashed across and became entangled in a stand of willows on the bank. Iris thrashed her arms and screamed in frustration until the branches released her. She sprinted away. Stout twigs broke against her shins. Brambles caught her clothing and backpack. Her exhausted panting became hiccups. Unable to catch her breath, she was forced to stop.

She lowered herself onto a downed log and waited for her lungs to stop burning. She looked around, took in the terrain, the light, the trees. She knew where she was. After she had discovered the patch of wake-robin, she would not be able to run away from the familiar. A comfort as a child but now a curse. Ash was everywhere and nowhere. She could never outrun her longing for him.

After several moments she rose and continued on, walking now, because there was no reason to run. Her skin prickled as if layers had been rubbed off. Her stomach was sour. Iris walked, eyes to the ground, her thumbs looped into the straps of the pack. She wandered, but here, in these particular woods, she could never be lost, not even when she most wanted to be.



Hours later, Iris sat leaning against a tree on a mountainside above the cabin. Her eyes were sore from crying and her legs ached. She had zipped herself inside her sleeping bag up to her waist. It wasn’t cold, but she’d gotten used to being comfortable in the last couple of months. Maybe she had gone soft, but she hadn’t forgotten how much it meant to feel the rough bark against her back, to taste the spring water she’d filled her bottle with, to have night falling down all around her like a heavy snowstorm, flakes of black instead of white. It didn’t feel good—she was too sad for that—but it felt right, especially now.